The Understudy
by Thelia Roe
Summary: Drabble/one-shot:   In a fit of jealousy and theatrical madness, Kurt does away with his only competition at McKinley. What was hers will now be his, one way or another.


_(re-uploaded to show the missing link for the story's inspiration, thank you to the commenter who let me know!)_

_Let me start off by saying that this is, in its entirety, a joke. Some talented lovely drew this: dekuku dot tumblr dot com/post/5356650736/all-the-solos-are-mine-now_

_Someone said this in response: "So does Finn belong to Kurt now too? Now that Rachel is out of the picture?"_

_And my brain went, "LOL, CAN DO."_

_So, that's . . . where this terrible, terrible thing came from. I apologize for it. I truly do._

_Other notes: I don't own Glee, I sincerely hope no one affiliated with it in any way, including extras and cleaning crew, ever sees it, and lastly, it opens in the middle and ends in the middle. Just a sinister, drabbly little one-shot._

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><p><strong>The Understudy<strong>

"Dude, what happened to you?" Finn is off his back in an instant, leaning up from his unmade bed and halting the spin of a ball in his hands.

Kurt smiles at the simplicity; he's precious. Playing with a ball. He exhales, nearly giddy, drunk on his freedom, his success, on the horrified concern on Finn's face. He says it. He says it out loud, what does he have to be ashamed of? "I killed her." His red, red hands find each other in a clap of excitement. "I killed Rachel."

Finn's skinny little brows crease together. Just precious. Precious, stupid boy. His precious, stupid Finn.

Kurt unfastens his tie and sits at the vanity, appearing briefly perplexed by the variety of products arranged in a half-circle to choose from. Something's got to get this stuff off without being too harsh. "I should've asked dad to plumb this when we remodeled."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Finn steps off the bed, a tentative footstep, another, drawing him closer until he can see the thinly-lined streaks of blood that his stepbrother's been speckled with.

"The vanity - right here," Kurt gestures with his hand to form a square in front of him. "It needs a sink. Don't you think it needs a sink?"

Finn nears his left shoulder, denying, battling back with swallow after swallow of his mouth's sudden swell of saliva the chill in him, the sensitive hollow between his ribs that might believe the unbelievable. "Kurt," he says, a questioning word, as if he's gone somewhere private that he needs to be drawn slowly back from. "What's going on, why do you - what's all over you? Are you - is this a joke?"

Kurt's face becomes ugly in its derision. It's never been able to handle that expression with grace. "I told you," he says, first bitterly, upset at being ignored.

Then he softens, plucks a cleansing pad from a nearby jar, and uses that other tone, the one he'd used when attempting to convince the family to redo the living room in tones of violet, the one he'd used when conniving Finn into an ill-fated viewing of Titanic: The Director's Cut over Christmas."Now, don't get hysterical; I know you'll be upset a while, I know. I'm not a monster. But it's better like this, for everybody. She made the club miserable, she hogged every opportunity for the rest of us to shine, and she turned you, silly boy, into a pound puppy, thumping your big, oblivious tail with happiness whenever she tossed you a stick to fetch. We're all better off."

Finn resists, a gesture losing its significance and strength with each passing second. "I don't get this. I don't. You're being sick, why are you playing this game?"

Kurt's eyes find him in the mirror before he turns around, as if he wants to be sure that Finn is there, doesn't want to waste his time. Blood is cracking on his cheeks and hands, and he'll have hell to pay tomorrow if he doesn't clear his pores.

"I'm done playing games, Finn. I've already wasted too much time on playing games. Her games, Coach Sylvester's, yours . . . no more games. She wasn't going to share." This must be enough explanation, because Kurt gives him a relaxed, vaguely judgmental look, urging him to keep up, and turns back to his cleansing pad.

Finn hears himself reacting as if he's somewhere else and watching it; hears the breathless repeating of unfinished prayer, hears one tear after another groan out of his eyes and hiss on his hot, dry face. He knows himself well enough to understand his own simplicity, but this is beyond anyone, beyond reason. He rejects the information Kurt is feeding him not because he's stupid, but because it can't be ingested. She can't be gone, he can't have to know that she's dead, he can't have to know that Kurt killed her. That he could kill anybody.

Nevertheless, with bile building in the back of his throat, Finn -does- understand that he needs to be afraid. Something is wrong, something's been broken. Burt and his mother will know how to handle this.

He covers his mouth as he crosses the room, heading for the stairs, where one of Kurt's arms braces out to stop him. Finn makes a low groan at the sight of crisp gray linen, Kurt's favorite dress shirt, soggy and red as beet pulp from wrist to elbow.

"Where do you think you're going?"

"Something is the matter with you," Finn says, voice cracked, eyes shining. "Something is the matter with you, and Rachel, Rachel is - hurt, she's hurt. I'm getting Burt." He attempts to dismiss him, but for once, Kurt refuses to let his body be ignored. He nails all five fingers from one hand onto Finn's chest and shoves him, but allows no space to grow between them.

"I told you," he says, perfect brow cocked with irritation at having to repeat himself; Rachel would -never- have had to repeat herself. Finn will have to learn to respect him. "Rachel's dead. There is no more Rachel. I took her place - this is how it's supposed to be."

Finn is choking on a terrified cry. "You can't," he says, but he hasn't enough sense to articulate what he means, 'you can't be serious, she can't be gone, you can't be my friend, my brother, you can't,' so he says it again, as helplessly as the first time, "You can't."

"So I've been told," Kurt replies, smile a shade too bright to express joy. "Over and over and over again," wagging a single finger in the air as when he's conducting himself in song. "But I can now, can't I?"

"I'm getting Burt," Finn repeats, but a preserving nerve in him tells him not to move, and then Kurt tells him, too.

"You're not. You're staying here with me, you're keeping your clumsy, awkward mouth shut. You're going to behave. That's how it works, isn't it? That's how it works now, that's how it was with Quinn, that's how it was with Rachel, that's how it'll be with me."

Finn is held still not by a superior strength in his opponent, but by panic, by denial. "You've cracked, you're fucking out there, what are you talking about?"

Kurt's voice visits the place where it becomes soft, sweet, a feather breath, a brush of cashmere.

"I'm taking her place, Finn. I'm taking what should have belonged to me from the start." He takes a step and so does Finn, one boy moving forward, the other backing away, until his tall back collides with a gray basement wall and Kurt's pinned him there with his hand out.

Kurt watches intently, blue eyes on brown, searching out the right time, that single, flawless second wherein Finn will stop telling himself it's a prank, or that he's dreaming; that's when he'll understand.

When it comes, when Finn's afraid, when Kurt's got a big man (who used to tower over him in every way) scared enough to shake, that's when he tells him, lowly, leaning closer to leave a kiss on his collarbone, "You're mine, now."


End file.
